The governor's request for de facto cuts in the University System budget would mean less money per student in coming years and could result in enrollment caps, limiting access to higher education, members of the Board of Regents said Tuesday.

Gov. Sonny Perdue has told the regents to expect no more than $1.69 billion in state funds for the 2006 fiscal year. University System officials said earlier they need $1.76 billion to maintain service.

The $1.69 billion would be an $80 million increase over the current year's budget. However, with enrollment increases expected at most of the 34 campuses, it would provide less money per student.

Despite Perdue's instructions to trim back their budget request, the regents are expected today to approve their proposed $1.76 billion budget and send it to the Office of Planning and Budget for inclusion in the state budget that will go to legislators in January.

Chancellor Thomas Meredith has warned that layoffs and a midyear tuition increase are possible if the system does not get the money it is requesting. The regents held their May tuition increase to 5 percent at Perdue's request.

Meredith would not comment Tuesday on the budget or a possible tuition increase.

The system absorbed a $68 million cut in August, chopped from the $1.679 billion originally approved for this year's funding by the state Legislature in the spring.

The cut was part of a $179 million budget reduction designed to cover the cost of the state's health care and education expenses, which have been rising faster than revenue for several years.

The burden hit hardest agencies such as the University System and the Department of Human Resources that have the largest number of employees.

In an August letter to Perdue, Meredith warned that persistent cuts would be detrimental to the University System.

"We cannot allow the high quality of instruction to be diminished," Meredith wrote, the day after Perdue announced the university's budget would be reduced by $68 million. "It takes decades to build an institution's reputation, far less time to lose it."

Georgia Tech President Wayne Clough, whose school lost $7 million in the August cut, said Tuesday that a substantial tuition hike could be necessary to offset the reduction in state funding.

"I think you've got to look at something on the order of 10 percent," Clough said.

For students on HOPE scholarships, that increase would have to be absorbed by the scholarship program funded through the state lottery.

Clough said staff reductions had forced Tech to increase class size and could mean the school would cap the number of new students it accepts. That could cost the state residents in future years, he warned.

"If we can't increase and nobody else can, students are going to start going out of state," Clough said.